Tuesday, 15 October 2019

 Mrs McARTHUR (Western Victoria) (17:53): My adjournment matter is for the Minister for Energy, Environment and Climate Change and concerns Powercor’s ongoing decision to use wooden, flammable poles in western Victoria rather than Dulhunty’s non-flammable poles. Western Victoria Region has fallen victim to fires caused by faulty power poles in recent years, most notably the St Patrick’s Day fires in 2018, which resulted in the loss of 23 houses, 40 000 hectares of land and 10 000 head of livestock. The poles currently in use by energy distribution network provider Powercor are either old, past their use-by date or new softwood, treated pine poles, built to last just seven years, susceptible to fire and weather damage and proven unsafe. At the current rate at which Powercor is replacing these unsafe poles, it would take 259 years to replace them all. Two weeks ago in the Geelong CBD yet another one of these power poles caught fire and left hundreds of properties temporarily without power, including the Geelong Magistrates Court.

Recently I visited Dulhunty Poles, a cement pole manufacturer in Geelong, who have tried to obtain a contract with Powercor but were rejected. Dulhunty Poles produce fireproof, termite-proof, waterproof, weatherproof, rustproof, lightweight, electrically non-conductive composite poles made from cement, clay and fibreglass that last more than 70 years. Dulhunty Poles are double the price, but this long-term investment would surely be a no-brainer. These cement poles are astronomically safer. They last more than seven times longer than the current wooden poles, are already used by AusNet Services in eastern Victoria, by Ausgrid in Sydney and Newcastle and by TasNetworks in Tasmania and are even exported to Tahiti and New Zealand. The current poles used by Powercor are clearly unsafe, unsustainable and impossible to replace at the rate they expire. The action I seek from the minister is that she ensures Powercor contracts Dulhunty Poles to produce cement poles for Western Victoria Region or to find an energy distribution network provider that will.